Thomas Davies FRS FLS was a British Army officer and naturalist. He was born c. 1737 in Shooter's Hill and died 16 March 1812 in Blackheath. He rose to the rank of Lieutenant-general in the Royal Artillery, he studied drawing and recorded military operations in water-colours during several military campaigns in North America. He became a noted artist and naturalist, he was the first to describe the superb lyrebird. His work was not well known until after a 1953 auction from the Earl of Derby's library, his paintings were shown as part of a major exhibition, 2 July – 4 September 1972, at the National Gallery of Canada. Little is known of his early life. In his will, he lists his father as David Davies from Shooter's Hill. Davies began military service at the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich in 1755. There he received training in topographic drawing to provide detailed and accurate drawings for military use. By 1757 he began service abroad in Canada, his earliest work is a drawing of Halifax during the failed Louisbourg expedition in 1757.

The next year, he recorded the military operations during the Siege of Louisbourg, including the Expulsion of the Acadians. Starting in 1759, he was with General Jeffery Amherst's forces, first at the Fort Ticonderoga and at Fort Crown Point. In 1760, he fought in the attack against Montreal and commanded a boat in a naval battle, which he illustrated. After the attack against Montreal, he surveyed the regions surrounding Lake Ontario for several years, producing both military maps and artistic landscapes, he painted a series of waterfalls, including views of Great Seneca Niagara Falls. His 1762 watercolour of Niagara Falls, An East View of the Great Cataract of Niagara, was the first eyewitness painting and the first accurate view of the falls. In 1776, Davies returned to North America with General William Howe during the American War for Independence. After the Battle of Long Island in August, he illustrated the British fleet in the harbour; that year, he continued with General Howe at the Battle of White Plains and the subsequent Battle of Fort Washington, where he illustrated the battle scene.

Under the command of General Charles Cornwallis at the Battle of Fort Lee, Davies captured the landing at and ascent of the Palisades by the British forces. This work has sometimes been attributed to Lord Francis Rawdon, since he bought it from Davies. In 1777, he was sent to command Fort Knyphausen known as Fort Washington. In 1780, he returned to England. Battle Illustrations After the war, he received several promotions and was assigned to command posts in Gibraltar, the West Indies, Canada. In 1799, he was appointed colonel commandant of the Royal Artillery, his last promotion was to the rank of lieutenant-general in 1803. In 1781, he was elected a fellow of the Royal Society, he was a fellow of the Linnean Society of London and contributed several articles regarding ornithology in Australia. In 1800, he was the first to illustrate and describe the superb lyrebird, in the Transactions of the Linnean Society of London, he read reports to the society on the southern emu-wren of Australia and the meadow jumping mouse of Canada.

Davies' style combines the precision of military artists with the skills of naturalists. His works have been compared to those of Henri Rousseau, George Edwards, Paul Sandby. Davies, Thomas. "An Account of the Jumping Mouse of Canada. Dipus Canadensis". Transactions of the Linnean Society. 4. London. Pp. 155–7. Davies, Thomas. "Account of a New Species of Muscicapa, from New South Wales". Transactions of the Linnean Society. 4. London. Pp. 240–2. Davies, Thomas. "Description of Menura superba, a Bird of New South Wales". Transactions of the Linnean Society. 6. London. Pp. 207–10. Chisholm, Hugh, ed.. "Lyre-Bird". Encyclopædia Britannica. 17. Cambridge University Press. P. 179. Dickenson, Victoria. Drawn from Life: Science and Art in the Portrayal of the New World. University of Toronto Press. ISBN 978-08020-8073-8. Hubbard, R. H.. Thomas Davies, c. 1737–1812. Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada. Lefkowitz, Arthur S.. The Long Retreat: The Calamitous American Defense of New Jersey, 1776. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press.

ISBN 978-08135-2759-8. Murdoch, R. H.. "The Brome-Walton Family". Minutes of Proceedings. Woolwich, London: Royal Artillery Institution. Olsen, Penny. Feathers and brush: three centuries of Australian bird art. ISBN 0-643-06547-4. Olsen, Penny. Upside down world: early European impressions of Australia's curious animals. National Library of Australia. ISBN 978-06422-7706-0. "Thomas Davies". National Gallery of Canada. "Thomas Davies". Dictionary of Canadian Biography. "Thomas Davies". The Canadian Encyclopedia

Capaware is a 3D general purpose virtual worlds viewer. It is a free software project which began in 2007, released for the purpose of promoting the development of free software in the Canary Islands by its Government. Capaware allows interaction with 3D virtual terrain mapping, is distributed under license GPL, it provides access to information that fits the specifications of the OGC. It was developed in C++ programming language. At present it works under Microsoft Linux. Capaware uses OpenSceneGraph as graphics engine, achieving high frames per second rates. Capaware's architecture has a plugin interface allowing new plugins. At present there is only a half-developed plugin as an example of the potential of Capaware:'Simulation of Forest Fires'. Adds functionality to simulate the progress of a forest fire.. Official website

The Wall of Love is a love-themed wall of 40 square metres in the Jehan Rictus garden square in Montmartre, France. The wall was created in 2000 by calligraphist Fédéric Baron and mural artist Claire Kito and is composed of 612 tiles of enamelled lava, on which the phrase'I love you' is featured 311 times in 250 languages; each tile is 21 by 29.7 centimetres It includes the words'I love you' in all major languages, but in rarer ones like Navajo, Inuit and Esperanto. The wall is open to public free of charge. Fédéric Baron first asked his brother, his foreign neighbours, to write words of love in their languages collected'I love you' in this way in over 300 languages and dialects of the world Claire Kito, a calligrapher assembled them in a work to be realised on enamel plates; the symbolism of the wall was a personal choice of the artist. A wall is, of course, a symbol of division and separation, here Fédéric Baron wished that a wall could be a support for the most beautiful of human feelings.

The red splashes on the wall symbolise parts of a broken heart, can be gathered to form a full heart. Official website